


Catch Me

by ellacj



Series: 52 Weeks of Swan Queen [17]
Category: Once Upon a Time (TV)
Genre: Angst with a Happy Ending, F/F, Fluff and Angst, mentioned outlaw queen
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-05-04
Updated: 2015-05-04
Packaged: 2018-03-28 22:35:25
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,280
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/3872275
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/ellacj/pseuds/ellacj
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>"Sometimes the heart sees what is invisible to the eye."</p><p>-H. Jackson Brown, Jr.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Catch Me

**Author's Note:**

> Spoilers through 4x19 "Lily"
> 
> Because I can't stop thinking about Dark!Emma and because I really wanted someone to beat up Robin

Emma winces. “That hurts,” she mutters.

“Maybe you should have thought of that before you beat up my boyfriend.” Regina sighs and continues rubbing the alcohol into Emma’s hand. “ _Ex_ -boyfriend.”

“He deserved it.”

“Did he now?” Regina raises her eyebrows, pausing her movements to look up at her. “Why did you do it, Emma?”

She doesn’t quite have an answer for that. She remembers it felt good to hit him like that, to see his blood on her hands, never mind the pain in her knuckles. She remembers she couldn’t _stop_ hitting him; kept going, kept punching him and kicking him until he was curled around himself on the floor and Regina’s hand was on her bicep pulling her back to reality. “He chose her,” she says quietly.

Regina’s face softens and she slouches back ever so slightly. She looks so small kneeling on the carpet while Emma sits on the couch, and there’s nothing Emma wants more than to lean down and kiss the troubled look off her face. “He didn’t choose her. She’s… having his baby.” She wrinkles her nose. “He can’t leave the child with her.”

“Bullshit.” She remembers she was angry.

_“You’re staying with her?” Emma’s voice sounds high even to her own ears and she’s not really sure how it happens but when her fist connects with his jaw she finds she likes it. “You’re gonna stay with that bitch over Regina?” Another punch and he’s bleeding, but she doesn’t stop there._

_Zelena watches with glee and Regina with horror as Emma hooks her foot beneath Robin’s legs and he topples to the floor. “You had something amazing in your life and you_ gave it up _.” She punctuates the last three words with three swift kicks to his gut, taking sick pleasure in the moans of the man below her. “How the_ fuck _could you want to stay here when the most wonderful woman in the world loves you with everything she has?”_

 _Regina’s shouting her name but she doesn’t care; doesn’t even hear as she wipes the blood – both Robin’s and her own – off of her knuckles and presses the toe of her boot to the hollow of his throat, stepping down hard enough to make him wheeze. “You were supposed to be her happy ending and you give her this?” She lifts her foot and kicks him sharply in the face, reveling in the crunch of his nose. “You don’t deserve Regina. You’re_ nothing _.”_

 _“Emma!”_ _Regina’s hand is on her bicep and her eyes are wide and Emma thinks she’s going to be sick. She didn’t mean to upset Regina. She was trying to protect her._

_She turns away and retches on the floor before leaving the apartment._

“Emma?” Regina’s voice is soft now, gently pulling her out of the memory and back to the present, her grip on Emma’s hand tightening slightly.

“Don’t ask about what I said,” Emma says through teeth clenched against pain in her hands and pain in her heart. “Please.”

Regina sighs again. She reaches into the first aid kit and pulls out some gauze pads to apply to the cuts on Emma’s knuckles. “You can’t keep doing this. I know you think you were doing the right thing-”

“I was.”

“Right. But Emma, it’s a slippery slope.” She presses the gauze to the cuts, avoiding Emma’s eyes. “I don’t want you to end up like me.”

Emma frowns. “You think I’m gonna become some Evil Queen?” She yanks her hand out of Regina’s grip. “That’s never gonna happen to me, Regina.”

“I said the same thing.”

“No, _fuck that_. I’m not turning evil – I just got angry!”

Regina sighs, sitting back on her heels and folding her arms across her chest. “Then answer my question. Why did you do it?”

“He hurt you,” Emma says firmly. “I don’t like when people hurt the people I love.” She doesn’t think about her words until she says them, but there they are now hanging in the air like weights around the ankles of prisoners, and they’re standing up and Emma doesn’t meet Regina’s eye. Maybe if she doesn’t look the inevitable rejection won’t come.

Maybe they can keep pretending.

“Emma.” This time her voice cracks when she says Emma’s name, and when Emma finally looks up there’s fear in her eyes and her arms move to wrap around her own waist. "I…”

“You don’t have to say anything.” Emma turns away and runs a hand through her hair, allowing the moisture in her eyes to spill over in a mockery of privacy. “Just… don’t say anything.”

“Emma,” Regina says, more firmly this time. She walks around so she’s in front of Emma again and hooks two fingers beneath her chin to lift her head and meet her eyes. And then she kisses her.

It’s the kind of kiss that ignites passions, the kind that makes husbands leave their wives, the kind that starts wars that rage for centuries. It’s the kind of kiss that Emma’s been waiting to experience, and there’s a salty tang from her own tears and Regina’s hands are in her hair holding her close, so close.

It’s over as suddenly as it began. Regina bites her lip and her eyelashes flutter as she blinks as though dazed. “I’m sorry.”

Emma frowns. “Why? That was so much better than I thought it would be.”

Regina’s gaze flickers away from her own. “Emma, you need to get better before we can be together. You have to know that what you’re doing isn’t good.”

“I know.” Emma moves back to the couch and sits down with her head in her hands, gently massaging her temples to get rid of her raging headache. “I know. I just… I don’t know how to control it. I just feel like I’m angry _all the time_ and I don’t know how to make it stop.”

Regina sits down beside her and rests a hand on her knee, thumb tracing gentle circles on the denim. “You need to have someone to support you; and you’ve got a whole town on your side. That’s something I never had.”

Emma drops her hands to her lap. “So you’re gonna be like my sponsor or something?”

“Exactly.” Regina smiles softly. “Darkness is an addiction, Emma; there’s no doubt about that. But it’s not one that’s impossible to be free of.”

“And you’re gonna help me?”

“Whatever you need. I’m here.”

“Thank you.” Emma’s smile is quivering but it’s there, and she moves her hand to cover Regina’s. “I’m sorry I beat up Robin.”

Regina gives her leg a comforting squeeze. “You just took the first step.”

“How many steps are there?”

“As many as it takes.”

Emma sighs, leaning her head on Regina’s shoulder. “Don’t tell twenty-eight-year-old me I said this, but I need you, Regina.”

Regina laughs gently, her body shaking with mirth beneath Emma’s head. “Don’t tell cursed me I said this, but I’m going to support you no matter what, Emma.”

They sit there like that for a long time; Emma’s head on Regina’s shoulder and their hands intertwined as though they were meant to all along, and maybe fate was wrong just this once. Maybe Robin wasn’t supposed to be Regina’s soulmate and maybe the Savior wasn’t meant to save anyone but herself. _Let’s make today the day we both beat fate_ , rings in Emma’s head and she tightens her grip on Regina’s hand in an attempt to anchor herself. It’s gonna be a long journey back to where she was, but she’s got everything she needs to make it sitting right next to her.

She’s ready to be okay again.


End file.
